Yun hopefully has some insight on this matter, as the special envoy in charge of drumming up support for action against North Korea. His suggesting the US ideal is diplomacy is not always expressed by officials, but apparently isn’t forbidden in the way that Secretary of State Rex Tillerson’s explicit offer of talks was.

Yun’s downplaying of the chances of an attack comes amid recent reports that the US has considered carrying out an attack in the near future, with an eye toward a “limited” strike that they think North Korea might not retaliate over.

5 thoughts on “Special Envoy: US Not Close to Attacking North Korea”

Brilliant idea 🙂 Indeed, pilots of cargo planes could fly over N. Korea and drop aid packages filled with food and medicines by parachute to the starving population.
This isn’t new. Back in 1948, Berlin was blockaded by the USSR; nothing was coming in, as trucks filled with food, clothing and medicines were stopped by Soviet soldiers and forced to turn back to whence they came. The US responded by sending aid packages by air to the beleaguered city, wherein they were dropped by parachute to the cheering Berliners .. After that, the USSR lifted the blockade.
Now, N. Korea presents a totally different scenario, and sending aid packages by air could be quite dangerous for the crews of the cargo planes wherein these packages would be stored.
Therefore, the only way to help the N. Korean population is to lift the sanctions that have been levied upon NK. Sanctions affect the civilian population, not the gov’t of the country that’s sanctioned, and is considered a war crime by US and International law.

Yes, the North Koreans have an interesting control system and its mostly based on central control of food and controlled starvation rather than direct coercion. Airdrops would decentralize food control for brief periods if done honestly. There is the danger of NK anti-aircraft defenses.

The peasants are kept weak and starving and unable to revolt, and the
regular army kept at odds with the peasantry they are robbing for food, so they can never unite against the government. Food drops would undoubtedly be subject to confiscation, so the effects would be satisfyingly disruptive, further eroding government control.

However, the last time the U.S. airdropped food was in Afghanistan, and they airdropped onto minefields and the packaging was the same yellow child-magnet colour as unexploded cluster munitions. That was more than a little dirty, and if the same psychos who planned that are in charge of a similar NK op, benefits would immediately evaporate.

Its been reported that sanctions are finally working, with NK readiness drills in decline and army units are raiding the peasants more often searching for food. The elites are well fed, if Kim is any indicator. Its possible there’s no shortage, just elite hoarding. There’s even an underground capitalist system in the cities based on raising rabbits and growing vegetables on the sly for luxury goods like smuggled CDs.

Since the government routes all smuggled goods, aid and trade through its control filters, dropping sanctions would unfortunately make small difference for common people and common soldiers.

On the bright side, Trump listens to somewhat sane advisors (for the MIC) and doesn’t presume to act unilaterally and make reality like a classic neocon. Nor does his team forget the buck stops at Trump and go wilding off on their own agendas.